Father Young tells it as it is

[der Berliner 3,263]

... the only thing Whyte did correctly was to bar the squad from talking to "failed attempts at journalism" like this fellow ...

 

What will be the post-mortem result if Rangers don't make it out of administration? I would suggest assisted suicide might be the coroner's verdict.

 

The financial machinations, the mismanagement and the greed of the club have dragged an institution to the brink of the abyss. Of that, there is no doubt.

 

At times, the owners of Rangers and sections of their support have shown an arrogance that has those of a different persuasion - and by that I mean followers of every other club in the land - spitting fury.

 

You will understand then their joy at the revelation that the school bully is on his knees - and their seizing of the opportunity to give him a right good kicking.

 

They want a lynching. And actually they might succeed, because the victim is now a little frail.

 

Let's cut to the chase here. The belief that there will always be a Rangers in some shape or form is not now actually justified.

 

There is a scenario now possible where they could board up Ibrox and leave it to rot as they once left dear old Cathkin Park - home of the late-lamented Third Lanark, another club that died of shame.

 

Rangers are suffocating, trapped in a tunnel where the oxygen is thinning and doors and escape hatches are slamming in their collective faces.

 

As Duff & Phelps receive their regular wages, everyone else is coughing a little nervously. No, make that wheezing alarmingly.

 

The prospect of a Company Voluntary Agreement to exit administration was the lifeboat. But it might be too late to call the coastguard now.

 

The players revert to full wages in June and, as of the final home game last week, the income has dried up. HMRC haven't turned up with the tax bill that could kill and owner Craig Whyte has resisted talks with former director Paul Murray and fellow bidder Brian Kennedy to release his grip on the key shares.

 

As it happens, I still believe that the aforementioned Kennedy remains the most likely salvation. But he has yet to nip into the telephone box and emerge as the caped crusader.

 

Amid this, supporters of the club have told a would-be owner from the United States that he isn't welcome. I couldn't believe that. If you are drowning, you don't get choosy about whose hand pulls you out the icy deep.

 

I really cannot see that anything but a "newco" and the embracing of that by the Scottish Premier League is left for the club now.

 

If only there was another way - relegation to the First Division maybe as punishment for the behaviour. But there is no mechanism for that.

 

The death of the Ibrox club would toll the bell for the Scottish game. In fact, it may already be too late. It strikes me that too many have little concept of how serious the situation really is.

 

Those who want Rangers wiped from the face of the planet for their misdemeanours, who want their chairmen to don the black cap when it comes to judgement day, are entitled to their opinion, but they should be prepared to live with the consequences.

 

Consider this: on a match day when Rangers are at home and Celtic away, far in excess of half the paying customers in the SPL are at Ibrox.

 

Remind me on what basis you can dispense with half your custom and still thrive and you, my friend, have found the secret of business heaven.

 

In the meantime, have compassion for 11 good men at the SPL who will stand in judgement of a football club needing mercy. Condemned if they grant it, pilloried if they don't.

 

Only a game? Aye, right.

 

BBC Sport

 

We should tell Ally and Co. that they should show the brains and not talk to this chap ever again.

[der Berliner 3,263]

Tonight he added on the BBC ... "Celtic will stroll to ten in a row now".

 

He forget the drivel he uttered somewhat earlier in the season:

 

Tucked away in my wallet is a betting slip growing ever more valuable by the day: I invested - some time ago at a price of 100-30 - some hard-earned cash in the prospect of Celtic winning the domestic Treble.

Actually, I tried to couple it with the prospect of Blackburn Rovers surviving in the English Premier League, because not for many a year have I seen anyone conduct themselves with such dignity and class as Steve Kean, but the turf accountant in question refused my bet.

In any case, I digress.

The champions elect stand - in reality - just three games from me welcoming my ship coming in, for they could not blow the title even if they asked John Prescott to be their midfield dynamo.

So, Sunday's Communities League Cup final against Kilmarnock, a William Hill Scottish Cup semi against Hearts or St Mirren and a final in the wake of that… and I'll l be trousering my gotten gains.

Celtic feel they have been squeezed off the back pages by the toil and trouble of the neighbours on the south side. And they might have a point… but bad news flogs newspapers. It is a fact.

Every cloud has a silver lining.

While Rangers hawk everything that isn't nailed down - and how they must wish someone had put a stake and tent pegs through the Arsenal shares - tree fellers in the Amazonian rain forests are banking bonuses as they try to keep up with the demand for newsprint.

And yet it would be crass not to applaud the players at Ibrox who agreed to a 75% wage cut. Would you do it to bring your employer salvation, especially if you had the prospect of a new job at your previous salary? I'll leave your own conscience to percolate.

Frankly I can't blame Celtic if they currently feel as if they must have put an X on their coupon for 'no publicity'.

But they do deserve a bit of credit for a) what they have achieved and b) massaging my bank balance.

 

Prove me wrong, Kilmarnock, prove me wrong St Mirren or Hearts and Aberdeen or Hibs… but I still believe that the Parkhead trophy cabinet will be like a jeweller's window before May has breathed its last.

It is utter hogwash to suggest their victories are faded out because of an impotent Rangers, limp with the exhaustion of their financial toils. Remember that 15-point lead?

Around that time the Ibrox club still couldn't beat Malmo nor Maribor nor Falkirk nor later Dundee United as they evaporated from cup competitions like the tooth fairy in the night.

Celtic are the best team in the country and are entitled to instigate a party which might run from Sunday until the end of May.

But then what? Do we have worthy champions who can make a genuine dent in the Champions' League and can Motherwell - now poised to be our other representatives - hang on to their coat tails at least until the domestic season is under way again?

Too good for Scotland, still ill-equipped for the Big Boys' playground?

Celtic's real test will come in the European months between July and Christmas in the three or maybe five years to come, during which they will face no domestic challenge worth the name from Rangers, who will be leaden booted with financial restraint.

That is why Neil Lennon will take a baseball bat to any suggestion of complacency and insist on raising the bar yet again in the summer transfer market. Have you see the quality on offer in the latter stages of the two European competitions?

On which subject, incidentally, if I hear anyone else suggest that the English Premier League is better than La Liga, I'll insist on launching another Armada making its way to Plymouth Sound.

[Zappa 0]

One of the funniest things all season was seeing Chic Dung wandering around the Ibrox pitch with a microphone and nobody to talk to! Oh, how he looked lonely and lost.

[Guest DietofWorms]

He is the Oxford English Dictonary description of the word 'Bawbag'.

[bluebear54 0]

Cliché filled dross.

I'm not aware that he has any relevant sources. He's therefore forced to rely on his intelligence and insight to compose blogs like these.

Ergo - cliché filled dross.

By the way, my grandad always used to say that you couldn't polish a turd.

[Guest Guardian]

It's folk writing stuff like that which makes our impending recovery even sweeter.

 

These bitter people will be left raging at the moon, cursing that their plan would have worked but for those pesky bidders.

 

It must be awful to go through life knowing the only way your team will ever get anywhere is if the opposition disappears. I can imagine the onslaught we'll get once a takeover goes through as they vent their rage at anything that moves.

 

The SPL and SFA will come under pressure to act.

[foggy dewhurst 0]

when a person cant say anything sensible its better to say nothing

[bluebear54 0]

when a person cant say anything sensible its better to say nothing

 

When a person can't say anything sensible it's best not to be a journalist.

[Guest blueoutthedome]

What a bitter little shite no one from our club should give this rat the time of day.

[andy steel 0]

You do have to feel for him...he's written all those words and not a soul will take one of the them seriously.

 

He's an interesting symptom, though. In England, the BBC Sports Dept. assigns local reporters to each region (both locally and nationally) and their remit is to establish contacts with staff at 3 or 4 clubs, build up a personal relationship with (especially) managers and in this way get first wind of any impending news. Pat Murphy, the Beeb's Midlands man, is a great example: if you look up his back history around the time of the Mick McCarthy sacking at Wolves, you'll see how close he had become to the big Yorkshireman, and although subsequent events have shown that his view - that to sack McCarthy was futile - was correct, you can see how his judgement is a bit clouded by the friendship he had established. Were Pat to have done a similar job in Glasgow, he would have been seen as a lackey by one side or the other, in the way that Chick Young is seen by cetlc fans, and that Lawwell's mouthpiece, Chris McLoughlin, is well on his way to being seen by us. Not even Pat's Irish name would have saved him if he'd been as friendly with, say, McCoist as he was with big Mick.

 

Btw, I though McCarthy handled himself superbly during that episode. Not all fitba managers have the intellect of a nine year old, it seems.

 

Nevertheless, just because a reporter builds up a relationship with people, and just because his job more or less makes it necessary to 'pick a side' a run with it, it doesn't excuse Chick's style. He really is a stand-out terrible writer, which in the field of Scottish football writing is quite something. So many words, so little point. At least in the online world we don't pretend this is our real job!